A Short Story: My Favorite Coffee

A friend of mine whom I comically refer to as the-guy-who-is-not-important sent me the following story which I deemed appropriate to share with you. The context as well as the message is quite self-explanatory, yet most often it is the simple things that are forgotten.  

The story goes like this: 

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with GOLF BALLS. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.The professor then picked up a BOX OF PEBBLES and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a BOX OF SAND and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous "yes”. The professor then produced TWO CUPS OF COFFEE from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.

"Now", said the professor, as the laughter subsided, "I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life”. The golf balls are the important things: your God, family, your children, your health, your friends, and your favorite passions....things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house, and your car. The sand is everything else-the small stuff.

"If you put the sand into the jar first”, he continued "there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you. 

Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your partner out to dinner. Play another 18. There will always be time to clean the house and fix the disposal. Take care of the golf balls first, the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand."

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented. The professor smiled. "I'm glad you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend!”.

Life Without Judging Others

Something quite unprecedented occurred to me the other day. I found a few minutes of free time on my watch and decided to browse through the old photos of my friends and acquaintances.

Usually when looking at the photos, I, unconsciously, label them with words that are rendered in my mind, “yeah good times, he looks much fatter here though”, “She looks pretty attractive, but it is a shame her teeth do not have a nice stature, and also I do not like to look at a flat screen TV no matter how beautiful the show is ;if you know what I mean!!!”, “Wow, that nose appears so large when taken from the side?”. I could go on and provide more and more examples of what scatterbrained descriptions could hit my mind like a bolt, many of which I would refrain from mentioning for the sake avoiding to enter the realm of obscenity!

Up until here everything seems normal; we all do judge other people whenever we can, and most often we are, in return, judged back. When a father comments on his son’s ludicrous hair style or comments on how voluptuous his daughter looks when she tries to dress like Lady Gaga then the children will go to school and start nagging about how vieux jeu and redneck their father is.

When the same husband comes home early so he could take the family to visit the grandparents and then comments on how those leather pants make his wife look fat (Discretion is advised: To all men in relationship, for your own safety do not try this at home!), and then the wife niggles that if he were to buy the other pairs of pants that were more expensive and would not be so stingy she also would not have to tolerate the sweat all over her. The family then goes to the grannies just to be lectured for half an hour about how the younger generations are making this world appear like a gigantic public lavatory, and at the end as they are watching the news they all become part of one team and begin to adjudicate the entire government for not providing them 98% tax break!!!

Stories of judging others are quite easy to spot, as a matter of fact, all it takes for you to witness this incredible phenomena first hand is to call your friend and start talking about your day at college, better yet, turn on the TV and watch the latest political commentary. The samples are ample. 

However, as I mentioned at the beginning of the post, something occurred to me the other day that really made me lost for words. As I started to look at the few photos that I had on my computer, I as if by chance, decided not to give any of those photos a label, I decided not to judge the people in those pictures and look at them just as they were. Somehow, the fat guy did not seem fat anymore, he merely looked more like, more like himself, the nose did not seem like it had blocked the way for the rest of my face to be seen any more, and the lady seemed more beautiful and attractive and every part of her face seemed more like…Katy Parry? No!, Hillary Duff? No!, LADY GAGA?!! Oh this young lady is a marketing master mind, but the answer is still No,… it seemed more like HER.

As you can see, by merely trying to stop judging the people in those photos and accepting their bellies, and noses, and teeth, and most importantly their very self as who they were not as who they looked like. In the magnificent book On Truth And Untruth edited and translated by Taylor Carman, Friedrich Nietzsche, the German philosopher describes judgment as follows:

“Judgment- the belief that this and that is so. Thus, judgment contains the avowal that an “identical case” has been encountered. It thus presupposes comparison, with the aid of recollection.”   

You see! The point is that we are all unique, there has never been someone quite like you before, and there never will. The same applies to all other people around us. Judgment is made unconsciously based on a false assumption that “an identical case has been encountered”, but the point is, we never encounter the same situation twice in life, yet so easily most of us end up being the judge for other people’s lives. 

Mother Theresa said so beautifully that "if you judge people, you have no time to love them".  

On TV, the internet, and true leadership!

The other day in my class, I gave a lecture regarding the various benefits that could be attained by reducing the amount of time spent on watching TV. I have recently come to believe that subtle dependence upon television can promote passivity and lack of creativity, and due to its convenience can easily end up not only consuming a great portion of our time, but also contributing to less mental and physical activities.

It has been four years that I have not watched TV! What?!! How is that even remotely possible?!!! Now you might instantly begin to imagine an eccentric geek with no knowledge of what is happening around the world, but quite frankly, I feel more mindful of the occurrences across the globe than ever. How? Pretty simple, for me the internet has become the sole source of gathering all the information that I need, do you need to watch NBC’s Meet the Press? Just log on to MSNBC’s website and watch the latest episode, better yet download the audio podcast and listen to it while driving to work; you want to watch the trailer of the latest box office hit? Just head over to Youtube and watch it in HD, feeling trendy? How about checking out the latest fashions on various designated websites?          

I even went as far as providing an oath for the class:

“Hi, my name is Daniel” I said as I raised my right hand “and I hereby declare that, thanks to the internet, I have been TV-free for four years”. Suddenly one of my students cracked a joke by saying that “the guy is clean”. 

I then quoted Steve Jobs saying that “You watch television to turn your brain off, and work on your computer when you want to turn your brain on”.

Following a hot debate, I mentioned that when my own children are born "I will give them an iPad, iPhone, and an Apple computer, but would not purchase a TV for my house".  Even though my beliefs regarding TV make complete sense to me, I was quite insensible to think that everyone should be in agreement with me.  I was then told by my students that true open-mindedness allows one to let their children choose for themselves. In reality, if my children would prefer to spend their entire days in front of TV then that is their choice, but sooner or later, it is likely that such lifestyle leads to difficulties and that is when they will come to me looking for suggestion.

When the students are ready the teacher will show up. Hence, if they are to follow my footsteps they should first want it internally. What I consider to be good and intellectual often could seem no more than a gibberish coming from an up-tight wacko. Well I certainly wish not to be dubbed as a Wacko of course! 

LEAD BY EXAMPLE, NOT FORCE

Talk Show 2.0 is back, more 2.0 than ever!

After a long break that seemed like ages, and following the cancellation of my trip to Turkey, the weblog Talk Show 2.0 resumes its activity for all the Talk Show attendants and the World Wide Web visitors. 

During the months that passed, the world has undergone drastic changes, akin to the type of which we usually expect to take place within a year or two. The major changes in the Arab world have resulted in insurmountable attention being given to the reformations that will ultimately determine the future of diplomacy all across the globe. 

Another major event was the now false-prediction of the end of the world on May 21st, well …I do not know what to say really, but the world did not come to an end as was predicted by so many mumbo jumbo prophecies that were out there just to prove that instead of being concerned with when the world is going to come to an end, we ought to simply get a life that is focused on the present. 

Despite all that happened, I for one, as an optimist, consider the world a better place for everyone simply because what we have less of these days are autocracies, censorship, driving without paying attention to the gas consumption, fatally ill children, and dogmatism; on the other hand, what we have more nowadays include but is not limited to education, public awareness, advanced technologies, more means for changing our way of thinking for the better, and of course iPads. 

For those of you who have taken the recent apocalyptic movies, and media buzz seriously, I have to mention that if one truly lives a complete life, every single day, he or she would act as though today could be the last day, then there is no such thing as worry for an apocalypse that will probably never come. 

WE ARE BACK, HAPPIER AND YELLOWER THAN EVER!
It is time to get our lives back on track, so as Nike puts it: Let us all “JUST DO IT”

Next time you were in your bed at night with your thoughts wandering about the concept of  doomsday, apocalypse, and the fact that tomorrow the world could come to an end please consider the following: 

As you are lying in your bed at night, it is already morning in Australia!

The real Apocalypse is going through your daily lives without noticing the limitless treasures that are scattered around you, the real apocalypse is having no one to love, the real apocalypse is having no concrete purpose, the real apocalypse is living in the past or the future, the real apocalypse is the desire to take rather than give, the real apocalypse is the belief that we need someone-else to come to our rescue instead of trying to change ourselves, and most of all, the real apocalypse is transferring our apocalyptic thoughts to others.



There simply cannot, and will not, be an Apocalypse out there, unless there is an apocalypse inside of you, so instead of worrying about the future try to fix the present.     


The best way to rectify the present is becoming happier and raising the aptly named Happy Planet Index that Nic talked about in his magnificent speech at TED. The recipe for a strong Apocalypse-antidote is well-mentioned in THE FORESIGHT PROGRAM:

1-CONNECT  [to other people]
2-BE PHYSICALLY ACTIVE  [we are meant to be in motion]
3-TAKE NOTICE OF THE LITTLE THINGS  [do not take things for granted]
4-KEEP LEARNING  [the secret to becoming healthy, wealthy, and wise]
5-GIVE  [the biggest joy in the world]

So everyone: Just Do IT.

The Old Game of The Middle East

When it comes to the oldest empires, traditions, and beliefs, you ought to look no further than the Middle East; arguably the most controversial locale on the face of the earth. 

The place where it has it all: history, literature, rituals, and off course, oil. However, one thing that this region seems to be intrinsically unable to possess is, well you guessed it, true democracy. For as long as history can recollect, the Middle East is meant to go through its upheavals using the same strategies and form of government that were employed by the generations that preceded them. One leader takes the leash with the notorious you-are-with-us-or-against-us attitude for some time only to be met by his tumble prior to giving his venue to someone with lower moral stature from a lower level of the society who ultimately pursues the same agenda. And the game repeats itself over and over….. until …..until the oil runs out ?!

O Kennedy Center hosted a worthwhile discussion on Wednesday, February 9th 2011 entitled "What’s Next? Tunisia, Egypt, and the Future of the Middle East " to elaborate upon the uprising in Egypt and Tunisia and its impact on the current state of affairs in the Middle East.

"The Middle East has been and continues to be a profoundly anti-democratic region in a world that is becoming much more democratic." stated Joshua Gubler, visiting professor of political science and later continued: "Even though Middle Eastern countries hold elections and call their leaders presidents, in practice, these countries are anti-democratic. The government is hiring people to go out and harass people who they think might be voting for anyone but them."

Professor Gubler also believed that the other profound phenomenon in the Middle East is poverty and wealth discrepancy that has given rise to outlooks where you could witness a fellow Egyptian "on a donkey cart side-by-side with a Mercedes-Benz ". For instance half the population in Egypt live in extreme poverty while the few minorities enjoy their life in million dollar mansions. 

What ultimately makes the real difference during various rebellions across the hot territory is the ever increasing young population that tends to proceed towards modernity as the age spectrum draws back in the direction of younger and younger ages. 

The social media such as Twitter and Facebook have proven to be formidable opponents of authoritarian governments in the Middle East. After all, these young people could easily transfer the news in a matter of instants and their leaders are well aware of that very fact. However, what remains unambiguous and infallible is the impotence of the aforementioned dogmatic figureheads who cannot cease this flow of information even when an overseer like  Al-Mubarak shuts down the internet and cell-phone services in Egypt.

Hence, it’s no surprise that the current shift of power in Egypt will most likely end up in the same situation as many other revolutions in the region, where the so-called game of theocracy is played over and over again. What remains to be seen though, would be the future of the Middle East after occurrence of all these transitions among the many regimes who translate democracy in their own words of dominion.

In the mean time, the old game of the Middle East continues.

Book Suggestion, If Tomorrow Never Comes by Marlo Schalesky

"Once, she’d been so sure that God would answer. So sure of her faith. God would not disappoint her, would not let her down. After all, But the years eroded that faith, washing it away, bit by bit, as surely as the sea washed out the sand on the shore.
 

Until today. Now, she had faith again. She would stop being that woman filled with pain and doubt. She would be filled with faith…and more. Right, God? She slowed. Doctor’s orders. Or at least, nurse’s orders. God didn’t answer. But it didn’t matter. She’d waited long enough. Tried, prayed, hoped. And finally, she’d happened upon those vials as if they were meant for her. As though it didn’t matter if she just slipped them into her pocket. A simple act. Easy. So why did she still have to bury them in the sand?

She knew the signs of guilt. Growing up as a pastor’s daughter taught her that.She knew a lot about guilt. I did what I had to do. That’s all. I can’t live like this anymore. It’s got to change. She’d done what she never would have believed. Kinna Henley had become a thief."

 Childhood sweethearts Kinna and Jimmy Henley had simple dreams—marriage, children, a house by the sea…everything they needed for happily ever after. What they didn’t plan on was years of infertility, stealing those dreams, crushing their hopes.

Now, all that’s left is the memory of young love, and the desperate need for a child to erase the pain. Until…

Kinna rescues an elderly woman from the sea, and the threads of the past, present, and future weave together to reveal the wonder of one final hope. One final chance to follow not their dreams, but God’s.

Can they embrace the redemptive power of love before it’s too late? Or will their love be washed away like the castles they once built upon the sand? The past whispers to the present. And the future shivers. What if tomorrow never comes?

Buy this Book 
Read an Excerpt 
Listen to an Audio Interview with Marlo

If Tomorrow Never Comes

If I knew it would be the last time that I'd see you fall asleep,

I would tuck you in more tightly and pray the Lord, your soul to keep.

If I knew it would be the last time that I see you walk out the door,

I would give you a hug and kiss and call you back for one more.

If I knew it would be the last time I'd hear your voice lifted up in praise,

I would video tape each action and word,
so I could play them back day after day.

If I knew it would be the last time,
I could spare an extra minute to stop and say "I love you,"

Instead of assuming, you would know I do.

If I knew it would be the last time I would be there to share your day,

Well I'm sure you'll have so many more, so I can let just this one slip away.

For surely there's always tomorrow to make up for an oversight,

And we always get a second chance to make everything right.

There will always be another day to say our "I love you's",

And certainly there's another chance to say our "Anything I can do's?"

But just in case I might be wrong, and today is all I get,

I'd like to say how much I love you and I hope we never forget,

Tomorrow is not promised to anyone, young or old alike,

And today may be the last chance you get to hold your loved one tight.

So if you're waiting for tomorrow, why not do it today?

For if tomorrow never comes, you'll surely regret the day,

That you didn't take that extra time for a smile, a hug, or a kiss,

And you were too busy to grant someone,
what turned out to be their one last wish.

So hold your loved ones close today, whisper in their ear,

Tell them how much you love them,
and that you'll always hold them dear,

Take time to say "I'm sorry," "please forgive me," "thank you" or "it's okay".

And if tomorrow never comes,
you'll have no regrets about today

I Will Stand Up Once Again by Daniel Mulligan

The rain drops pounding the ground,
As I amble across this secluded land,
Remembering the thought provoking fact,
That habitually proves hard to understand.

Life is meant to be a series of trial and error,
Failure, no matter how boundless, ought not to induce terror.

 

The calamities that befall us in our life,
Regardless of their atrocity, from loss to strife,
Are there to impart the knowledge of existence,
And remind us the importance of persistence.  

That no matter how many times I fall,
I will stand up once again and will not stall.

No achievement has ever been attained,
Or any trembling heart of love gained,
Without failing over and over again,
Till you be triumphant in the end.

Talk Show Podcast Episode Ten

Social networking, online communication, and Facebook have become a substantial component of our routine lives over the years to the point where some prefer online interaction to face-to-face ones. 

The current edition of Talk Show Podcast is aimed at elaborating on the notion of social networking as well as providing some background and analysis for the renowned website Facebook. Later in the course of the program, Steve N.B., internet devotee and adept pianist joins us for an intriguing interview regarding the subject matter. 

Alternatively you can download the podcast here

Few moments with Steve N.B.

Artistic soul is something that is assumed to be rare, but when it comes to Steve N.B. this is certainly not the case. Steve is a 19 year-old student of architecture as well as a professional pianist. 

     All you need to do is to listen to him play the piano for a short period of time before you recognize that he undeniably has earned the term professional with all its corresponding accessories. He has begun learning the piano from an early age; as the years went by, he became more and more enthralled by the mother of all musical instruments, and  nowadays he and the piano are literally inseparable.

     I asked Steve to join me for an interview regarding social networking and Facebook, which he so gently accepted. I have to mention at first, that Steve himself uses the internet and social networking websites for about six hours a day grossing the notorious title geek in the process, thus surely he could be dubbed an internet enthusiast with sufficient knowledge and experience in the medium.

     It’s Steve’s firm assertion that it’s indispensable to embrace the new internet movement “in order to be competitive “ simply because the modern wolrd has undergone substantial changes as a result of the internet.  “I believe the internet has revolutionized our lives in many ways, it has changed the concept of communication and entertainment “said he and later continued: “in the mean time search engines provide us ways to search any information worldwide and [the means of] getting up-to-date”.

     Steve maintains that much the same as any other entity, the internet has its own share of advantages as well as disadvantages; for instance, albeit we all can benefit from swifter, finer, and more convenient access to information and communication, we cannot deny the threats of identity theft, spamming, and cyber stalking.

    Nevertheless, the merits of the internet by far surpass its drawbacks and hence it proves essential for implementing the day-to-day tasks. Social networking is a pivotal facet of Steve’s life, and he attributes it to not only a place to catch up with friends, but also an ambit to be submerged in while witnessing a diverse and multi-cultural environment and learning “a thing or two about new cultures or languages”. 

     Like many of us, Steve believes Facebook to be the throne keeper of all social networking websites with insurmountable potentials along with a “super positive atmosphere”.  When I asked him what he thinks of the validity and rigor of friendships on Facebook as opposed to real-life friendships he cited:

     “ Facebook is a means of social networking where you find the opportunity of finding your oldest friends from all over the world.” However, he said: “we should try to make our relationships stronger and better using the power of Facebook”. 

     In due course, I myself truly took pleasure in interviewing Steve for many reasons, from his passionate tone of speech to his rational behavior.   

You can listen to the entire interview at Talk Show Podcast Episode Ten.

Let us reform our educational system

If   we were to determine the most substantial element behind the functionality of the society as well as its long-term outlook, we would be pointing our fingers at nothing but the educational system. 

The current trend of instruction and its inadequacies

     It’s through this hierarchy of grade-based knowledge that many individuals discover their pathways in life, while the others lose the very sough-after clue that they were hoping to find as they entered the school. Whether you like it or not, the current educational system is robbing the students of their creativity due to its lack of flexibility, biased evaluation process that favors conformity, and typecasting all the learners in the same manner despite the immense dissimilarities among every single one of them.

     In a world where the so-called educational inflation, the process in which degrees no longer guarantee employment and the minimum requirements are rising from Bachelor’s to Master’s and from there to PhD, has changed the way we assess our workforce in a way that could ultimately precipitate the manifold stirs that are ensuing at the present time. 

     Global economic crises, insurmountable waste and lack of proficiency, increased level of fraud as well as crime, lower payments and salaries, monetary divisions, general lack of happiness, and most of all, uncreativeness that has led many nations into intellectual poverty are all but few of the repercussions of the aforementioned obsolete academic establishments. 

     Hence, it’s evident that our scholastic needs surpass that of mere evolution, and instead, demand a robust revolution within the composition of our educational systems from kindergartens to universities and in its entirety. 

     The following speech will address the urgent necessity of a reform in the educational systems all across the globe;              

The Rise of Women

The ancient conception that attributed a woman to being the second class citizen, the weaker sex, responsible for trivial matters, unaware of the economic, social and political issues, less thoughtful, and overall inferior to men, whether you like it or not, is but extinct.

Welcome to the new world; the epoch which has brought with itself multitude of women who have proved themselves worthier than heaps of men. Embrace the new world that has seen many women as scientists, politicians, analysts, managers, astronauts, authors, trainers, and even presidents.

Suffice to say that the feminist movement since the dawn of its establishment, has spread the message of unity and self-reliance among all the women around the globe.

We, now, live in a situation in which women in many parts of the world contribute to more than half the income of a given family, and being the sole breadwinner of the household is nothing uncommon for the ladies of the 21st century either. The role of women in our contemporary life-style by far exceeds what it used to be few centuries back.

The aforementioned change in the attitude towards women did not come cheap however, many women, for years and years, persistently fought for their various rights, from suffrage, and guardianship, to equal pay and publicity.

Do not believe me? You can check out the following video that elaborates on the rise of women, and the fact that females have managed to surpass their male counterparts in various aspects: